Armageddon For Beginners, Dave Mckay [reading books for 7 year olds TXT] 📗

The destruction of the Prostitute is symbolically a description of the Battle of Armageddon, where God's wrath is poured out on her and all that she represents. But it may be literally describing an earlier battle, one between her and the Beast, who is assisted by the ten horns.

Whatever it is that the Prostitute represents, she herself is destroyed in the battle that is described in Revelation 18, apparently enabling the Beast to take control of the world. However, after the battle of Armageddon, the False Prophet, Dragon, and Beast are all taken alive, as prisoners. (Revelation 19:20)

We have already suggested that the Prostitute represents the economic side of the Beast. In Revelation 18, where merchants, shipping companies, and kings mourn her passing, this becomes even clearer. (Revelation 18:3, 9-11, 15-18) We believe that the Prostitute is America, and that the battle being described is one that took place before the Tribulation, between her and Russia, with Russia assisted by the Third World (the ten horns) and perhaps by the Dragon (China). We will deal with the time sequence later.

Revelation 17:3, and 9 both say that the Prostitute "sits on" the "Red" Beast. What this may mean is that their relationship is not perfectly amicable. They are both world powers, but their emphasis is different. And at some stage the Prostitute gets the upper hand.

What a prostitute wants is money. American capitalism, like prostitution, is built squarely on greed, or the love of capital. A prostitute may talk of love, but her real interest is money. America, too, talks of God when her real interest is just in getting more and more capital.

The Red Beast, on the other hand, is primarily interested in turning the human race totally against God. The Devil's only interest in money is to use it to get control of our souls. Religion, even if it is hypocritical religion, does not appeal to the Devil either. But he is forced to put up with these two lies until he can get people so totally depraved that they will worship him and blaspheme God without shame and without payment. Only then can he turn on the Prostitute and destroy her.

We said earlier that the Roman Empire eventually divided into East and West, and that this seemed to be symbolised in the two legs of Nebuchadnezzar's statue. (The legs are the parts of the statue which represented the Roman Empire). The legs led to two feet, which were described as clay mixed with iron. We said that these represented democratic governments and totalitarian governments.

In the Twentieth Century, Russia became the totalitarian superpower which represented the East, and America became the democratic superpower that represented the West. Atheism was an important part of the communist ideology, whereas religion (in particular, the Protestant work ethic) is an important part of the capitalistic ideology.

The kings of the earth, the merchants of the earth, and the shipping companies of the earth have all been assisted by the American ideology.

Now Russia and communism have suffered a deadly wound; and America is "sitting on" top of world communism. See the picture below.

But the prophecy says that the Beast (with the help of the ten horns) will turn on the Prostitute and destroy her in one hour! The Bear will pluck the Eagle with the help of the Panther.

Remember too that the ten rotating members of the U.N. Security Council are from the Third World. The five permanent members include Russia and China (both "red" communists, with a Bear and a Dragon as their symbols)*, and three anti-communist members: America, the U.K., and France. If America could be destroyed, then the U.K. and France would be powerless to stop a communist takeover. Three kings would be subdued, and the other ten would be free to give their support to a communist world government.

Now for the reason why this story comes during the time of God's Wrath: When Babylon (represented at the moment by America)** falls, the new world empire will become the new Babylon; for Communism too, like all governments, is ultimately based on greed. It will then become the responsibility of the communist version of Babylon to provide the merchants and kings and shipping companies of the world with business. It will also be the communist version of Babylon that will finally be destroyed at the Battle of Armageddon (Revelation 16:19). The Lamb will destroy that Babylon, whereas the Beast will destroy the American version. (Revelation 17:16-17)

(*Note that both the Beast and the Dragon are described as being "red". (Revelation 17:3; 12:3)

**I checked the Encyclopedia Britannica to see if there is a city named Babylon today. There is only one city named Babylon that is significant enough to rate a mention in the Encyclopedia Britannica. It is a burrough of almost a quarter of a million people, and it is located on Long Island, in New York, U.S.A., just a few miles from Wall Street)

 

Appendix, Chapter 22

Luke 4:5-6. The Devil… showed him all the kingdoms of the world…, and said, "All this power… is delivered to me."

John 12:31. Now is the judgment of this world. Now shall the prince of this world be cast out.

John 14:30. Hereafter I will not talk much with you, for the prince of this world comes, and has nothing in me.

John 16:8, 11. When he is come, he will reprove the world of… judgment… because the prince of this world is judged.

Revelation 13:18. Here is wisdom. Let him that has understanding count the number of the Beast…

Matthew 24:15. When you see the abomination of desolation… (Whoever reads this, let him understand.)

Revelation 19:20. The Beast was taken, and with him the False Prophet… These both were cast alive into a lake of fire.

Revelation 18:3, 9-11, 15-18. All nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication. The kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth are waxed rich through the abundance of her delicacies… The kings of the earth… will bewail her and lament for her when they see the smoke of her burning… saying, "Alas, alas, that great city Babylon, that might city! For in one hour is your judgment come." And the merchants of the earth will weep and mourn over her, for no one buys their merchandise any more… The merchants… which were made rich by her will stand… weeping and wailing, and saying, "Alas, alas, that great city that was clothed in fine linen and purple and scarlet and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, for in one hour so great riches is come to nothing." And every shipmaster and all the company in ships, and sailors, and as many as trade by sea stood afar off and cried when they saw the smoke of her burning, saying, "What city is like unto this great city!"

Revelation 17:3, 9. He carried me away in the spirit to the wilderness, and I saw a woman sit on a scarlet coloured Beast, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns… Here is the mind that has wisdom. The seven heads are seven mountains on which the woman sits.

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23. Some Weak Spots

We have moved rather quickly through some difficult passages. Some readers may feel they are being asked to believe too much too quickly. In order to make the text read more smoothly, I have often stated as fact what is technically just "theory". Some of my theories have been built on the assumption that an earlier theory is correct.

Some of this confidence has come from a familiarity with other passages that strongly support the main points of the theory. But there is a tendency for any theorist to see things that support his or her theory, while overlooking things that might challenge it. So this chapter is a breather, in which we will consider some of the weak spots in the theories which have been presented so far. We will, in some cases, however, produce counter-arguments to defend our position.

The most universal argument is that prophecies say nothing about the future that we don't already know. This is the approach taken by most "respected" theologians. They discuss all miracles, all talk of God, all interpretations of prophecy with a kind of intellectual aloofness which implies that even faith itself is just a sociological (or psychological) phenomenom for them to dissect and discuss. They bend over backward to convince themselves that there is no such thing as the supernatural, except in the weak minds of lesser individuals than themselves. I simply cannot accept this faithless approach.

There is a story about a labourer working at a seminary who was saying "Praise the Lord!" over and over to himself as he worked at digging a ditch on the campus. A theology student observed this, and asked him to explain why he was so excited. The uneducated worker said he had just been thinking about how God parted the Red Sea and allowed the children of Israel to walk through it on dry land.

The seminary student decided to enlighten the poor man. "It wasn't really the Red Sea," he explained. "We believe it was actually the Sea of Reeds, which is a marshy stretch of land that is only covered by about eighteen inches of water."

"Well, praise the Lord! That's even more amazing!" exclaimed the workman.

"And what's so amazing about that?" asked the would-be theologian.

"It's amazing how the Lord was able to drown all of Pharoah's armies in only eighteen inches of water!" he replied, with a big grin on his face.

Theologians are faced with a similar problem when it comes to Bible prophecy. The Book of Daniel states that it was written during the time of the Babylonian Empire and the start of the Medo-Persian Empire. There is no evidence to suggest that this was not the case, except for the fact that it predicts the Greek Empire by name. On the basis of that alone, the (unbelieving) experts have had to say that it must have been written during the time of the Greek Empire.

The fact that it predicts the year in which Jesus Christ was crucified (see pages 51-56 of this book) should also force them to say that it must have been written during the time of the Roman Empire. However, they know that this is not true, so they largely ignore the prophecy about Christ's death. "Expert" theologians rarely express open belief in it, or in anything else that is supernatural. They know that, among their colleagues, such faith is looked down upon. The politically correct thing to do is to explain away all miracles.

A similar problem confronts the skeptics with regard to prophecies about the Mark of the Beast in the New Testament. It is becoming more and more difficult for people to dispute its accuracy as they see what it predicted actually happening in today's world. What it said would happen is going to happen, just as the Bible said it would. So now people are openly admitting that they don't care whether it is true or not, because they have no interest in obeying God, if doing so is likely to bring them any discomfort. The same evil generation that asks to be shown miracles, still refuses to change when they see them!

So we match their contempt for God with our own contempt for their approach to prophecy. Certainly there are non-miraculous aspects of prophecy which simply state universal truths; but there are also aspects which accurately predict the future; and they both need to be taken together to arrive at the whole truth.

There are others who would disagree with us because they interpret symbols in The Revelation as representing other events than what we have described. Many say that things described in The Revelation have already happened at various times throughout history. The eruption of the island of Krakatoa, for example, is seen as the mountain which fell into